Zygogen, LLC.,l has announced a non-exclusive, United Kingdom sub-license agreement with DanioLabs for the right to use Zygogen's Z-Tag(SM) technology for internal drug screening.

DanioLabs, based in Cambridge, UK, is a drug-discovery company that identifies and develops treatments for neurological and ophthalmic diseases.

The terms of the agreement include license and royalty payments to Zygogen, which is the exclusive licensee of the US/European issued patents, "Transgenic Fish with Tissue-Specific Expression," owned by the Medical College of Georgia.

Z-Tag combines the power of the zebrafish's transparent organogenesis with physiologically relevant expression of modified genes and markers to allow the development of quantitative zebrafish assays for automated compound screening.

"We are pleased to license Z-Tag(SM) for use in our integrated drug- discovery process," said Tony Sedgwick, CEO of DanioLabs.

"A major component of our research programs involves the use of zebrafish. They are a key tool for obtaining rapid in vivo information related to human disease, which can lead to the development of novel treatments. This technology complements others we have in-house, and will give us an additional system to combine with our chemistry and screening strategies."

As vertebrates, zebrafish embryos are becoming a valued tool for obtaining live animal data early in the drug discovery process. Large numbers of embryos can be arrayed in multi-well plates with nanogram quantities of drug, providing a less expensive and faster screening alternative to mammalian models.

"Zygogen provides access to transgenic zebrafish to a variety of pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. For companies such as DanioLabs that already have internal zebrafish capability, we license Z-Tag for internal compound screening, which allows us to expand the revenue-generating opportunities of our technology," said Nina Sawczuk, co-founder and chief executive officer of Zygogen, LLC.

The U.S., European and Australian patents and other foreign patent applications for Z-Tag cover compositions and methods of making and using transgenic zebrafish with tissue-specific expression of a gene.

The patent was initially filed in 1997 by Zygogen's scientific founder, Shuo Lin, Ph.D., the sole inventor on this patent. Zygogen also encourages non-commercial research using Z-Tag transgenic zebrafish by academic investigators.

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